Lindsey Mastis

He’s being called “Balloon Boy.” But did 6-year-old Falcon really hide from his parents– or did his parents tell him to hide? Cameras were fixated on a home-made balloon that everyone thought would cause the boy’s death. But he was found hiding in the attic hours later. Then, on the Larry King Show, the little boy mentioned doing it for the show. What show? The family is scheduled to be on the 100th episode of Wife Swap. Could this whole saga be a PR stunt?

Hoax or not, it got me thinking about other well-known stunts. Here’s my top 5:

 

MICHAEL JACKSON IS ALIVE:
A German company created a low-quality video of a Michael Jackson look-alike hopping out of a coroner’s van shortly after his death. I saw it aired on one of the prime-time entertainment shows as possibly being real. My jaw dropped.  Talk about wanting to check the facts first. The German company sent out press releases about it being a hoax beforehand. They wanted to show how easy this kind of stuff spreads.

 

PYRAMIDS IN EGYPT:
Yep. National Geographic got a lot of flak for this one. They had some nice photos of the pyramids, but none good enough for a vertical cover. So they squeezed a couple together to make this beautiful photograph. Today the cover is used as an example in media ethics courses. Along with it are TIME‘s cover of OJ Simpson, and Janet Cooke‘s “Jimmy’s World” made-up article that won her a Pulitzer Prize.

 

THE MOON LANDING IS FAKE:
Oh yes, it’s always fun to read The Onion. And it’s even funnier when people believe it’s all true. Apparently, two Bangladesh newspapers believed a recent story. They reported that Neil Armstrong gave a presser to talk about how the moon landing was a hoax. They eventually apologized for failing to “check the facts.” Neither knew The Onion was a satirical newspaper.

 

BOSTON BOMB SCARE:
This little stunt was supposed to promote Aqua Teen Hunger Force. The light boards (which look kind of like Lite-Brite) went up overnight. There was even video of the boards going up. But some people thought the light boards were bombs. Boston shut down bridges and other parts of the city. The guys that came up with the campaign faced criminal charges. It’s kind of funny when you think about it, but this one was a major FAIL.

 

MARTIANS INVADE EARTH:
In 1938, Orson Welles broadcast a radio-rendition of H.G Wells’ “War of the Worlds.” He did it to compete with another radio station. In this case, the audience was told– multiple times I might add– that it was not real. But back then, people changed their radio dials as much as we change the channels on our TVs. They missed the announcement about it being fake. Some sued. And according to some reports, there were miscarriages and early births due to the panic and stress it caused.